Grimsby boss Jolley: Cobblers have one of the ‘strongest’ squads in League Two

Grimsby Town manager Michael Jolley has described Northampton’s squad as ‘one of the strongest in the division’ ahead of Saturday’s clash at the PTS Academy Stadium.

Jolley, who took over from the sacked Russell Slade in March, has overseen a mixed start to the season with the Mainers currently 20th in Sky Bet League Two, just four points above the relegation zone.

They will be hoping to break a three-game losing run on the road against Northampton this weekend, however Jolley is expecting a stiff test after talking up the quality of Keith Curle’s squad.

“I think Northampton have got one of the strongest squads in the division if I’m honest,” he said.

“They’ve got real depth to their squad and they can select several different combinations of players and still have a very strong team.

“Obviously, they didn’t start the season as well as they would have liked. But since Keith came in they’ve had a number of good results.

“But we think that, on our day, we can match most teams in this division and we think that we can do well in the game.”

Grimsby beat League Two leaders MK Dons in the FA Cup two weeks ago and also pinched a late victory over Crawley Town last time out, bringing them to within four points of the Cobblers.

Jolley added: “It’s up to us to try and make sure we perform to our best level, and if we do that then we give ourselves a chance of getting a result.

“We had another clean sheet last week, which was great - the back four, and the goalkeeper, is functioning well.

“We weren’t as fluent in the Crawley game as we were in the MK Dons game with the ball, so we definitely want to try and be creative and have good movement, good passing, and good attacking play when we have the ball.

“And if we can glue all of that together with the kind of resilience that we’ve shown in some games recently then we give ourselves a good chance.”